Monday, May 21, 2012

ASA v. Coalition for Marriage Ltd (2012)

His Grace has today responded to the ASA in their investigation of the Coalition for Marriage advertisement.

Dear Investigations Executive,

Further to His Grace’s previous email of 14th May, to which you responded answering none of his questions because, you aver, they ‘go beyond (his) involvement in this case’. And further to his subsequent email of the 16th, to which you responded with an apology for the ‘confusion or upset’ you have caused, and an admission of error for failing to mention that you had no authority to make any demands upon him, he is pleased to respond to your investigation thus:

It appears that the Advertising Standards Authority is no longer solely concerned with sales promotional advertising. Further, you now manifestly push a standard which ranges from mediocre to middling, and you fail to realise that you are an ordinary limited company with absolutely no legal authority whatsoever. In light of this, you ought to initiate a formal investigation into your own harassing misrepresentation of your powers and misleading trade description.

By choosing to investigate a promotional campaign which sought merely to uphold the traditional view of marriage, it is clear that you have expanded your remit to incorporate the promotion of political causes and ideas, which the CAP Code states specifically is excluded from the scope of your competence, except where they are ‘direct solicitations of donations for fund-raising’. That is manifestly not the case with the Coalition for Marriage advertisement: the only direct solicitation was for people’s signatures upon a petition. That the campaign is political is in no doubt, because HM Government have decreed it so by their decision to investigate those schools which advocate support of the marriage petition, which a minister has referred to as ‘political campaigning’. Your decision to investigate the complaint with threats and menaces, contra your own online remit, constitutes bullying, harassment and intimidation, which amounts to censorship of the cause for the retention of traditional marriage and the idea that marriage is a union of one man and one woman.

By sending out ‘complaint’ papers which demand responses with such phrases as ‘We require you to respond...’ and ‘we will need to see robust documentary evidence to back the claims and a clear explanation from you of its relevance’; and by doing so with demands to answer your questions by a certain deadline with threats of punitive action for non-compliance, you fraudulently convey an excess of power and claim an authority which you do not, in law, possess. You impress upon the recipient that you are the superior moral agent, and that submission and obeisance are the only appropriate response. Authority which is exerted without right is an illegitimate use of power; illegitimate authority is tyranny; and tyranny leads to injustice, which can have no authority at all. By abusing your self-certified power and self-authenticated authority for the perpetuation of an image of your self-integrity, you deny all authority. You ought to rename yourselves the Political Substandard Tyranny.

Your treatment of His Grace has been mendacious, oppressive, and partisan. This has only become apparent as he refused to comply with your demand to keep all correspondence confidential. How many others have been intimidated, harassed and bullied into submission by you as they suffered in silence, fearful of the consequences of disclosure?

Your treatment is mendacious because you now know that your one identified complainant, the Jewish Gay & Lesbian Group, did not register any complaint at all. Yet you chose to validate that alleged complaint by disseminating it without exercising due diligence, and so your lie is deliberate. Your claims of other unnamed complainants are thus tainted. Your recent claim (published on 15th May upon your website) that you were seeking His Grace’s voluntary assistance and ‘have made clear’ that he is ‘not compelled to respond’ is not supported by the facts. Not least because this was only ‘made clear’ in your second email to him (which was received at 5.40pm on 15th May). Indeed, it appears that your second email was sent solely to permit you to be able to claim publicly on your website on the same day that you ‘have made clear’ that there is no compulsion to respond. This is not merely mendacious; it is manipulative, which is further harassment.

Your treatment of His Grace is oppressive because you appear to claim the authority of the British Government, the Office of Fair Trading and of the Courts to demand his personal reasons for supporting the English laws regulating marriage. You selected him alone from the blogosphere for this intimidation when larger and more powerful entities had also promoted the same advertisement. And your treatment of His Grace is partisan because, through your decision to escalate to ‘formal investigation’ sundry vexatious and invented complaints, and by your unlawful threats made with reference to the Courts and other available sanctions, you have sought to punish his support of a cause, which has become political, and his commitment to an idea, which is moral. Your Agency is charged with ensuring truth in advertising, not with advancing a political agenda by suppressing the free debate that underpins our democracy.

That your Chairman is also Vice President of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality is not without significance in this case. If Lord Smith of Finsbury were (permitted to be) on the Board of Sainsbury’s, and the ASA had taken the decision to investigate Tesco over scurrilous allegations of some ‘offence’ caused to 10 anonymous complainants, one of whom was the Jewish Gay & Lesbian Friends of Sainsbury’s, the impartiality, reliability and validity of your investigation would be fatally undermined, and justice could not result. Since you are determined to enter into the political arena and make judgments about advertising which seeks simply to uphold the tradition view that marriage is heterosexual, Lord Smith must either resign as Chairman of the ASA or as Vice President of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality. There can be no actual and must be no apparent conflict of interests in his functioning, because it is increasingly evident that certain people desire to prevent others from voicing reasonable moral and moderate political opinions and are prepared to use state and quasi-state agents to achieve their illiberal ends.

Finally, to your specific questions relating to the Coalition for Marriage advertisement which is deemed by 10 people, including (you insist) The Jewish Gay & Lesbian Group, is ‘offensive’ and ‘homophobic’. You attached four screenshots taken from His Grace’s blog, apparently from his post of 12th April. You have specified that he is not required to respond to any allegations of ‘inaccuracy’ which relate to the poll research, and, presumably, since the final frame is merely an invitation to sign a petition, there is nothing to respond to or justify on that frame either. So, you are concerned to hear from him on the allegation that this:

and this:

are ‘offensive and homophobic’, despite your unreasonable refusal to respond to his utterly reasonable request to know how the term ‘homophobia’ is being used in this context, which request you insist goes ‘beyond (his) involvement in this case’. His Grace responds as follows:

The first of these frames, as you observe in your Complaint Notification and is evident above, ‘featured photos of couples on their wedding day’. His Grace is at a loss to understand how a montage of (apparently) happy couples of (apparently) complementary genders on their wedding days may be in any sense ‘offensive and homophobic’. Since such scenes are played out at hundreds of churches and registry offices all over the country throughout the year every year, and since the BBC was free to broadcast the wedding of HRH Prince William (male) to Catherine Middleton (female) without incurring allegations of ‘homophobia’, it is difficult to discern how this frame may be considered in any sense ‘offensive’. Further, taking ‘homophobia’ in the vernacular (that is, an expression of ‘hatred’ towards homosexuals, lesbians, bisexuals and the transgendered, as opposed to the fear of man or the same gender), if it may constitute ‘hatred’ of homosexuals to publish and distribute images of heterosexual couples on their wedding days, His Grace would like to know how the 10 complainants even know that all these couples are, in fact, the gender they appear. It is eminently possible that some of these brides are men in drag, and he would have thought that the LGBT community (especially the Jewish Gay & Lesbian Group) really ought to be admiring of the quality of transexualism and/or transvestitism which may be evidenced.

The second frame of ‘evidence’ you adduce simply states ‘I do’. On this point, His Grace concurs wholeheartedly, for this is indeed a term most offensive. His Grace was author of the Anglican marriage liturgy approved by Parliament and he specifically employed the phrase ‘I will’, not ‘I do’. ‘I do’ is an inadequate affirmation of the present instant and quite inferior to the emphatic future continuing ‘I will’. So, yes, this frame is most offensive. But, again, His Grace is at a loss to discern how it may be construed as ‘homophobic’.

And yet he is 'required' to respond to these allegations under CAP Code (Edition 12) rule 4.1 (Harm and offence).

It ought to be obvious to any objective, reasonable person, and also to any rational, impartial organisation, that a set of wedding photographs and a quotation from the marriage liturgy cannot possibly be offensive to any reasonable or rational person. They are only deemed to be so by those whose agenda is acutely political. The fact that you subjectively and unreasonably chose to escalate their complaints to the level of ‘formal investigation’ constitutes an intimidating attempt to encroach on the freedom of speech. That you identified the specific (non-)complaint of The Jewish Gay & Lesbian Group suggests deficiencies in your due diligence and inadequacies in your judgments. These complaints ought to have been summarily dismissed as frivolous, vexatious and malicious.

The conduct of the ASA in this matter has been unreasonable and unjust. You need to develop a considerably higher threshold as to what may be reasonably considered sufficiently offensive to warrant any investigative effort on your part, especially when that offence is allegedly ‘homophobic’.

His Grace hopes you find the above response more beneficial than that received from Private Eye in the case of Arkell v. Pressdram.

This is not the first cock up Chris Smith, Lord Smith of Finsbury has been responsible for as I well remember the fiasco of Mary Allen's appointment at Covent Garden. Mary Allen (ex repertory actress and Cambridge educated like Lord Smith started spending money on refurbishment of CG that it had not got!

So I think Lord Smith should be taken and dropped into the nearest 'memory hole'!

Now, having demolished that lot of pompous, posturing, preening popinjays, how does Your Grace feel about taking on the Law Society over their cancellation of Wednesday's Marriage Colloquium, due to take place at their London headquarters, because it does not fit with their diversity policy?

Cranmer, did anyone complain to you directly about the adverts? If they did, perhaps you could blog about them, and your responses (with names redacted).

I'm just wondering, because if they didn't contact you directly, I think what I find most distasteful is that rather than expose the argument being made by C4M, the complainants have sought to enlist a body which would bully those who speak their mind.

However, it's not so long since the machinery of the UK state was enforcing religious uniformity of some kind or other, or persecuting those of other races or sexual orientation. In some places, they still are. At least you've got lawyers. Young gay people in Iran don't even get that.

In the UK, we have a long history of debating ideas rather than suppressing them, of which we should be justifiably proud.

I think you're wrong about marriage, Cranmer, but I support your right to make your argument, and I don't support those who would enlist the mechanisms of the pseudo-state to suppress your speech and writing.

As you rightly allude to, how many other organizations or individuals have fallen foul of our masters ever more over reaching Thought Police?

This country along with a few other westernized nations including The USA, Canada and Australia are known around the world as bastions of free speech in particular and all other aspects of freedom in general.

How did we come to this frightening situation?

Why are our owners picking on cultures that have up to recently acted as examples to the world of how liberty works for the benefit of all of Gods conscious creations?

Answers.

Because our owners hate freedom as exemplified by the teachings of Jesus Christ, and long since decided to utterly destroy both.

Because if our owners can successfully destroy freedom in these particular parts of their planet, continuing to do so around the rest of the despotically ruled world, will be made that much easier.

'It is eminently possible that some of these brides are men in drag, and he would have thought that the LGBT community (especially the Jewish Gay & Lesbian Group) really ought to be admiring of the quality of transexualism and/or transvestitism which may be evidenced.

Thinking of cause and effect, your communicant recalls an interview on TV earlier this month with a defeated politician, who announced his retirement from politics at the same time while standing outside his substantial residence in a leafy north London suburb.

Now, Your Grace will no doubt be aware that Lord Smith of Finsbury is a protege of Ken Livingston, the defeated politician in question.

Purely hypothetically, one can imagine the scene in the conservatory of the Livingston residence one week later, say Sunday 12th May. Let us speculate that the great man has invited his inner circle, those who have nost loyally supported him in his career, to a comemorative luncheon. Lunches like these are always opportunities for an exchange of conspiracy theories, prejudices, gossip and slander, after all, what else is conversation? Over desert and coffee, the lubrication is usually sufficient for some uninhibited 'scoping' and/or flirting to take place. Inevitably the names of the guilty who had been influential in the victory of the Tory buffoon Boris would be discussed. Amongst them of course may have been His Grace, whose call to arms in support of Boris must have rankled. Did a Livingston loyalist declare, 'Not much point in suing or pursuing Charles Moore at the DT, too well financed, but Cranmer, well, leave him to me.'?

Of course, all this is just idle speculation on the part of your communicant. But the letter arrived on May 15th, did it not?

Congratulations on such a comprehensive and blistering response. It will serve as a blueprint and letter template for the downtrodden and linguistically challenged during their next brush with officialdom.

Your Grace,I am at one with all the support given to yourself over the brilliant riposte to the ASA.I would say however that I don't trust these organisations and as my granny used to say, don't count your chickens until the fat lady sings.I'm not a Thomas, but I will be relieved when their judgment is pronounced.PS Have you sent it to the Business Secretary?

The response to Private Eye in Arkell vs Pressdram was not from the ASA as stated above. But I would heartedly recommend that the ASA use the same respone to the original complaint and all the silly replies it has received from Cranmer as it is likely to be the most cost effective way of dealing with the matter.

Elby the B, one wonders just how diverse the Law Society's 'diversity' policy is when they will not countenance a conference on marriage.

Their website states that 'The Law Society represents solicitors in England and Wales. From negotiating with and lobbying the profession's regulators, government and others, to offering training and advice, we're here to help, protect and promote solicitors across England and Wales'.

What has this to do with promoting gay marriage? (Which is what their 'diversity policy' is REALLY all about.) What about solicitors who are opposed to gay marriage? Does it protect them too?

It is time some of these overweening puffed-up organisations were cut down to size.

As our present Archbishop of Canterbury doesn't seem too enthusiastic about protecting marriage, I hoped that a Phoenix-like resurrection from a former incumbent might do the biz.

I'm sure that the ASA are indeed looking for the most cost effective way of dealing with the matter. However, I suspect that your recommendation that they tell Cranmer to f-off will end up with them in even deeper hot water than they are already. Let's hope that they take your advice!

I agree - I'm sure that they could think of a suitable euphemism. You should note that I suggest they take a similar line with the original complaint.

You perhaps should note that the ASA received over 3000 complaints from those with political and religous objections to abortion advisory services - so this is far from being a one sided issue. Perhaps if the ASA took a tougher line in dealing with those looking to play politics then they might actually be rather more effctive in dealing with the rather more obvious abuses of their code e.g. How often is something described as free when it clearly isn't?

Lord Smith was our local councillor when I lived in South Oxford in the early 80s. Dealt with the dog shit problem in the local park well. Suspect that is about his limit, but I also suspect he is a brown noser of the highest order, hence his rise to Lordship etc.

Lord Smith wants to marry his boy friend, but he can't have children with his boy friend, he can't become 'one flesh' with his boy friend, so what sort of marriage is that? It's not marriage. The gays are stealing the word marriage for something which is manifestly not marriage. Apples are not oranges, red is not blue. If they succeed, how can we distinguish heterosexual marriage to avoid confusion in the general population, and especially for our children. Can we invent a new word?

A sterling riposte Archbishop, worthy of one who is wise, and versed in the ways of the law.

The Inspector is particularly concerned with waste in the public service. By the very ability of ASA to turn its head to matters political indicates an obvious over manning in the organisation. We all know that public agencies are playing their bit in reducing public expenditure, indeed, many have vanished, or will vanish, with any good they were doing absorbed by another QANGO.

Through His Grace, the Inspector calls for an immediate investigation into ASA manning levels. That a reduction is necessary is beyond doubt, the question is how much. The going rate seems to be in the order of 25%. He challenges the ASA to make clear any objection they have to this. Furthermore, the Inspector wishes to know the savings 25% will achieve, expressed as millions of pounds.

Let this be a warning to other QANGOs.. You abuse your powers at your own risk. You WILL be identified, and you WILL suffer the consequences. Let no one be in any doubt about that !

I'm interested in finding out what the complainers thought was offensive and homophobic about the advert. The claim is bizarre to me. One might wonder if the motives of the C4M members are homophobic but that's a different ballgame altogether. I'd doubt that very much too, myself. They're almost certainly just religious.

"I do."I have often wondered where that comes from. When Charles was marrying Diana the television commentator outside was saying, "And now the couple are saying their 'I do's," and of course they weren't. Is that what they have to say in registry offices?

"Your recent claim (published on 15th May upon your website) that you were seeking His Grace’s voluntary assistance and ‘have made clear’ that he is ‘not compelled to respond’ is not supported by the facts. Not least because this was only ‘made clear’ in your second email to him (which was received at 5.40pm on 15th May). Indeed, it appears that your second email was sent solely to permit you to be able to claim publicly on your website on the same day that you ‘have made clear’ that there is no compulsion to respond. "

Did they really? That was a neat maneuver on their part. I will be even more distrustful of civil service speak in future.

How about a hate crime against law respecting supporters of the biblical view of marriage ? The ASA are certainly "offensive" as prohibited by S5 Public Order Act and we, as well as His Grace, are offended by their remarks and conduct.

I don't think you can refer things direct to the DPP (rather than via the Police) asking them to look into a crime that you cannot specify. I suppose Cranmer could claim threatening behaviour - but somehow my guess he isn't feeling too threatened and is rather enjoying this - and anyway the Police have better things to do.

Tory Lad, the sheer unBritishness of the ASA rankles, but your point taken. His Grace is a respected right wing Christian blogger. Lets just sit back and wait for one or two right wing Christian MPs to come to his side. Then we’ll see some action...

If they mess you about any more, you might send a copy of this response to the CEOs of their main funding sources and suggest they consider their positions. Copy to the tabloids of course, all being fair...

Mr Inspector, there is no doubt in this communicant's mind that ASA Limited should be investigated.

Please see bluedog's post @ 12.36 on 19th May following His Grace blog 'Further ASA response - an admission of error'. Information relating to ASA Ltd can be found on the Companies House website, and to some extent on the ASA's own website.

As an earlier poster has noted, the exact role of the ASA is probably a matter for the Business Secretary.

I'm no legal expert but it seems to me the ASA definitely has a case to answer over the way they misrepresented themselves. As His Grace says, they may have done the same thing with others, so they should be investigate (not by themselves though). When I lodged a complaint on their website I was told to complain to their CEO or my local MP. I did both. I wish someone would bring them to book. It would do no harm to give these reprobates a dunking in their own cesspool

About His Grace:

Archbishop Cranmer takes as his inspiration the words of Sir Humphrey Appleby: ‘It’s interesting,’ he observes, ‘that nowadays politicians want to talk about moral issues, and bishops want to talk politics.’ It is the fusion of the two in public life, and the necessity for a wider understanding of their complex symbiosis, which leads His Grace to write on these very sensitive issues.

Cranmer's Law:

"It hath been found by experience that no matter how decent, intelligent or thoughtful the reasoning of a conservative may be, as an argument with a liberal is advanced, the probability of being accused of ‘bigotry’, ‘hatred’ or ‘intolerance’ approaches 1 (100%).”

Follow His Grace on

The cost of His Grace's conviction:

His Grace's bottom line:

Freedom of speech must be tolerated, and everyone living in the United Kingdom must accept that they may be insulted about their own beliefs, or indeed be offended, and that is something which they must simply endure, not least because some suffer fates far worse. Comments on articles are therefore unmoderated, but do not necessarily reflect the views of Cranmer. Comments that are off-topic, gratuitously offensive, libelous, or otherwise irritating, may be summarily deleted. However, the fact that particular comments remain on any thread does not constitute their endorsement by Cranmer; it may simply be that he considers them to be intelligent and erudite contributions to religio-political discourse...or not.

The Anglican Communion has no peculiar thought, practice, creed or confession of its own. It has only the Catholic Faith of the ancient Catholic Church, as preserved in the Catholic Creeds and maintained in the Catholic and Apostolic constitution of Christ's Church from the beginning.Dr Geoffrey Fisher, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1945-1961

British Conservatism's greatest:

The epithet of 'great' can be applied only to those who were defining leaders who successfully articulated and embodied the Conservatism of their age. They combined in their personal styles, priorities and policies, as Edmund Burke would say, 'a disposition to preserve' with an 'ability to improve'.

I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.Margaret Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher LG, OM, PC, FRS.(Prime Minister 1979-1990)

We have not overthrown the divine right of kings to fall down for the divine right of experts.Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC.(Prime Minister 1957-1963)

Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.Sir Winston Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, FRS, PC (Can).(Prime Minister 1940-1945, 1951-1955)

I am not struck so much by the diversity of testimony as by the many-sidedness of truth.Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, KG, PC.(Prime Minister 1923-1924, 1924-1929, 1935-1937)

If you believe the doctors, nothing is wholesome; if you believe the theologians, nothing is innocent; if you believe the military, nothing is safe.Robert Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, KG, GCVO, PC.(Prime Minister 1885-1886, 1886-1892, 1895-1902)

I am a Conservative to preserve all that is good in our constitution, a Radical to remove all that is bad. I seek to preserve property and to respect order, and I equally decry the appeal to the passions of the many or the prejudices of the few.Benjamin Disraeli KG, PC, FRS, Earl of Beaconsfield.(Prime Minister 1868, 1874-1880)

Public opinion is a compound of folly, weakness, prejudice, wrong feeling, right feeling, obstinacy, and newspaper paragraphs.Sir Robert Peel, Bt.(Prime Minister 1834-1835, 1841-1846)

I consider the right of election as a public trust, granted not for the benefit of the individual, but for the public good.Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool.(Prime Minister 1812-1827)

Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.The Rt Hon. William Pitt, the Younger.(Prime Minister 1783-1801, 1804-1806)